


the beating heart

by downmoon



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: AU, M/M, Rivarmin Fest, Sexual Content, Supernatural - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-06-14
Updated: 2014-07-12
Packaged: 2018-02-04 15:53:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 10,554
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1784713
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/downmoon/pseuds/downmoon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Armin sighs against his mouth, and Levi knows he’s in trouble.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. rudhira

_If you could only see the beast you’ve made of me  
I held it in but now it seems you’ve set it running free_

 

As soon as they’re past the bouncers, Levi’s heading straight for the bar, Hanji’s shouts swallowed up in the noise of the crowd and his own purposeful ignorance. It’s the third bar of the night, and he’s not even pretending to have a good time anymore. He’s hungry and he’s tired, and completely, irritatingly sober, but it’s only 10, and Hanji can not be convinced to go home until they all see the ball drop, champagne toasts, midnight kisses, all those clichés. He’s pressed up against the bar, trying to wave down the bartender, surrounded by sweaty, sticky people, and a bass line so loud it makes his heart stutter in his chest. 

When the bartender finally weaves his way over, Levi orders whiskey, and another as soon as he puts down the first. When he’s tipping back the third, and stumbling onto an empty stool, his face is warm and he’s hating Hanji less, and there’s a stranger shouting something at him.

_“What?”_

“I said, you look downright miserable.”

Said stranger, when he turns to look, is some androgynous little waif that honestly leans a little too slight and girly for Levi’s taste in men, but he drinks whiskey when he wants to take someone home, and right now, the waif’s looking nice.

“I am.” 

The stranger laughs and slips into the narrow space next to Levi, waving at the bartender.

“New Year’s isn’t the time of year to venture out, especially in this part of the city. Are you here with somebody? Hi, yeah, I’ll have whatever he’s having.”

“And I’ll have another one.”

The whiskey’s starting to creep warm and fuzzy through his body and his brain, blurring his thoughts into smashes of color and the buzz of the music in his head. The stranger smiles at him and pours their drinks when the bartender comes back with a bottle and another shot glass. The stranger’s almost leaning against him when he passes the shot glass back to Levi, but he doesn’t mind too much. The stranger’s pretty enough.

“Let’s turn that frown around. In no time at all, you’ll forget you were ever miserable in the first place.” 

Levi snorts and tips his glass to the stranger’s, the clink hardly heard over the sound of the music. He feels loose, relaxed, and now the music’s pumping through his veins instead of pounding in his head. 

“Are you even old enough to be in a place like this?” and really, he can’t help it that his tongue’s gotten so loose, and it’s a perfectly valid question, besides. There’s something soft, youthful, in the features of the stranger’s face, cute little nose and a pretty pink mouth. He’s modern, precisely dressed and hair long enough to be pulled into a loose bun, and he just _looks_ young. The eyes, though…there’s something about his eyes, and the way he holds himself that piques Levi’s curiosity, especially when that gaze sharpens on him and his mouth quirks coy.

“Baby, I’m plenty old, don’t you worry.” 

The stranger’s definitely leaning in now, almost hovering over Levi. It’s bold movement, and invasive, and if Levi weren’t so drunk, he’d send this kid off in tears. But he is drunk, kind of, and right now he doesn’t care, caught up in some euphoric trap of this sweet-faced stranger’s. He can feel where the stranger’s thighs are pressing against his own, and the pressure of his hand when he slides in close to Levi’s ear.

“I’m Armin, by the way.” Armin’s voice is intimate in his ear, raspy and warm like the whiskey. It makes goose bumps prickle across his skin, and his head spin a little bit. Levi’s curiosity spins into lazy arousal.

“Levi.”  
Armin leans back, elbows propped on the counter behind him, legs still pressing close to Levi’s.

“Ooh, a Hebrew name. ‘Attached’. A lot of meaning in that, a lot of significance.” 

Armin shifts again, and now his fingertips are brushing the top of Levi’s thigh. His eyes glow reddish when the lights turn.

“Tell me, Levi, who are you attached to?”

Levi shivers.

“Nobody.”

“Nobody? There’s nobody in your life? No friends, no god? No sweet lover to crawl home to?”

His brain is sluggish, fuzzy around the edges, and he now regrets four shots on a mostly empty stomach, because he doesn’t know what to say. There’s some deeper meaning to Armin’s question, he knows, something more than a question of relationships; he can tell by the way Armin is looking at him. There’s a thought tickling at the back of Levi’s mind, something pressing, but he can’t think. All he can see are those eyes, the electric gaze heavy and prying across Levi’s face as the seconds tick by eternal. 

“I know you aren’t just asking ‘bout my _status_ , but I’m too drunk to think about this anymore.”

Armin looks surprised for a second, perhaps not expecting such a blunt answer, then laughs loud. He pours the drinks out again, still giggling, and Levi’s swallowing more whiskey. Armin’s hand is on his thigh.

“Maybe we can get into philosophical discussions another time. We’ve still got to get rid of that misery. How are you feeling?”

The way Armin asks is perfectly conversational and pleasant, but his gaze is intense again, ancient and sharp. Levi’s pinned by that heavy gaze, shudder tripping down his spine.

There’s a pause in the music, a brief instant when the entire club is noiseless before the beat starts again and a cheer goes up in the crowd. He can’t breathe for a second when the music stops, so used to the constant pressure of sound in his chest, but Armin presses in a little closer and he feels like he’s come back into awareness. 

He stares at Armin’s lips, where his teeth press into his red, red mouth, and he wants to touch. Levi slides a hand around Armin’s waist and tugs him closer, leaning close to Armin’s ear. Armin curls a hand around his shoulders.

“I’d feel better if we got out of here.” 

Armin laughs soft, breathless in his ear.

Hanji expects him to take Petra home, Petra, Hanji’s _dearest friend from college_. The girl Hanji dragged along tonight, when Levi was supposed to be playing wingman. Petra’s cute, and she’s funny and bright, but she’s also soft, and sweet, never coy, never alluring. Her gaze isn’t fierce when it drifts over Levi. Her eyes are big and brown and they beg to be held, to be loved, affectionate and needy. Not to be bitten and bruised and fucked.

“Let’s go, then.”

Levi sways when he stands up, his entire body buzzing warm. He feels a little like he’s floating, just drifting along on autopilot while Armin’s hands press gently on his back, guiding him through the crowd. He stumbles a little bit at the coat check, his mind a little clearer now that he’s out of the press of sweat and smoke. Reality’s starting to creep up on him now, and he realizes he hasn’t hooked up with a stranger since college. He’s a 9-to-5 man now, with responsibilities and a roommate and things to do tomorrow. He doesn’t fuck people he just met; Hanji does, but he doesn’t, not anymore, and Hanji…

“Wait, my—”

His head feels cement-heavy all of a sudden, and his whole body tilts to the side, unsteady lurch. He doesn’t process anything until Armin’s crowded into his space, saying something in his ear, pushing Levi’s arms through his coat. There’s a magnetic pull in Armin’s gaze when the beautiful boy looks at him, the color of his eyes shifting again. Armin loops a hand through the crook of Levi’s arm and tugs him forward, and he drifts along.

His mind is a hazy blend of dark night and flashes of light, by the time he realizes he’s outside, and that’s right before Armin pulls him under a streetlamp and kisses him. Armin’s mouth is cold on Levi’s, and it makes him shudder. He can’t breathe, pushing for more, his hands achingly cold in Armin’s hair. Armin is speaking again, when he pulls away, but Levi’s too drunk or too tired to understand him, too horny to care. Armin sighs against his mouth, and Levi knows he’s in trouble.

Their steps are punctuated with more kisses, Armin’s smile, white noise of the city as it spins around them. Levi bangs his knee when they trip up some steps, grunts, ignores the flare of pain in favor of pressing Armin against the door while he’s fumbling with the lock. They’re inside, and it’s warm, and the door’s banging shut behind them. Armin yanks on Levi’s scarf, shoves his jacket off his shoulders, shrugs out of his own. He leaves them on the floor, two dark puddles of fabric. There’s a tumble into bed before Levi fully processes where he is, and the change in direction makes his head spin. Armin’s pushing at his shirt, sliding his cold hands up Levi’s chest, and when it’s gone, and mouths meet again, Armin bites Levi’s lip hard enough to draw blood. He makes a noise against Levi’s mouth, something soft, a fluttery whimper, as he swipes his tongue over the beading blood. Levi swallows the sounds, pressing him down further into the bed. Armin arches his back and grinds his hips up, digs his fingers hard, and it forces soft noises out of Levi’s throat.

Naked skin to naked skin and Armin is cold. His fingers burn cool bruises into Levi’s shoulders and hips, when he pulls closer. 

Levi’s dizzy.

Armin is ferocious and loud, clawing at Levi’s back when both their cocks meet. There’s something wicked in the slant of Armin’s smile and it hurts when he digs into Levi’s skin. The haze in Levi’s mind is worse now, and he’s quickly losing all sense of everything but the pleasure he feels and the noises Armin makes. He’s consumed by this _creature_ beneath him, his cold white skin and eyes so bright and blue they look like they’re glowing when they catch the light of the streetlamps through the slatted shades. There’s some survival instinct clawing at his brain when Armin flips the both of them, but it’s quickly silenced when he slicks up his fingers and slides one into Levi, pretty mouth pushing over the head of his dick simultaneously, and Levi moans.

There’s an entirely different focus in Levi’s mind now, a lance of warmth curling around in his belly, and he finds himself twisting one hand in Armin’s golden hair to keep his hips still. His chest is heaving and he can’t stop the noises that spill out of his mouth, and he hates it. He’s never this vocal during sex, never, but now it’s too good, too overwhelming, too perfect, and his head is still spinning with alcohol. Armin is all precise movements and hot tongue, and when he crooks his fingers, Levi’s hips move of their own volition.

When he comes, it’s with Armin’s name on his lips, and he’s still trying to catch his breath, breathe in breathe out, when Armin presses himself in. He kisses Levi again, pinning Levi’s thin wrists above his head, and moves rough enough to make Levi groan. Armin’s breathing hard, like Levi, like he can’t take it, like he’s lost and dizzy and as drunk on Levi as he is him, but their eyes meet, and Levi wonders at what moment this became a game of predator and prey. The warning bells scream this time, when Armin smiles and his sharp white teeth gleam in the light from outside and the bones in Levi’s wrists feel like they’re grinding when he tightens his grip. Armin nudges at Levi’s neck, licking it, pinching the skin gently between his teeth. He hits a spot inside Levi that makes him stutter out _“again”_ and sucks a hickey over his pulse point, but there’s something possessive and alarming about the movements, and the instinct to escape is tickling the back of Levi’s mind again. Armin is muttering against Levi’s throat, whispering something that’s lost in the sound of his own moans, and for a second, there’s something sad about the noises, some kind of broken desperation Levi doesn’t understand, and then he’s sinking his teeth into the juncture of Levi’s neck, and Levi screams.

It hurts like nothing he’s ever experienced, worse than the time he broke his femur and it poked out through the meat of his thigh, or the allergic reaction that swelled his throat nearly closed before he was rolled into the emergency room. He wonders, idly, if he’s dying, and why it hurts so badly. His body reacts on its own instincts as he thrashes and squirms, trying to shake the pain off, but Armin crushes Levi’s hands in his own and pushes his hips down hard. There’s darkness creeping up on Levi now, as he slowly loses the strength to fight back. The tips of his fingers and his toes are starting to go numb, prickly little star sensation that makes it hard to move his joints. Armin pushes harder inside him, pulling away from Levi’s throat as his eyes slide shut and he shudders in ecstasy. Blood drips from his mouth and he loosens his grip on Levi’s hands, but he’s too weak to do more than press limply at Armin’s chest. 

Armin’s gasping in Levi’s ear, chanting his name like a prayer, an invocation. Levi is drowsy and sluggish, one arm curling around Armin’s neck to pull him close, to hear more of him coming undone. He likes the sound of his name in Armin’s mouth. Armin is restless, his fingertips moving sweetly over Levi’s hips, his chest, tongue still working over the pulse point. Levi’s limbs feel dead and heavy, and he’s so tired. When darkness presses in, the one he can’t fight anymore, he’s vaguely aware of Armin’s tongue on his neck, and those cool fingers stroking over his cheek.

 

When Levi wakes, he’s tangled up in a bed that isn’t his, and Armin’s hand is pressed to his chest. His phone is vibrating on the nightstand, and he’s disoriented and sweating, heart pounding fierce enough that for a minute he can’t catch a breath. The room’s dark enough to be misleading, heavy curtains pulled close around the window, and he has no idea what time it is. He shifts, trying to ease the ache in his ass and rub the sleep out of his eyes. Armin’s hand curls into a fist over his heart when Levi wiggles, but he doesn’t wake.

He’s sore and stiff when he slips out of the bed, and he can feel the budding of a hangover right behind his eyes. He gets dressed as quickly as he can, using the light from his phone to find his clothes and boots. He just missed call number 19 from Hanji, and he’s got 67 unread texts, but he’s nauseous and clammy and still shaking from the pounding of his heart and he desperately does not want to deal with Hanji yelling at him right now. He just wants to leave.

When he cracks open the door of Armin’s bedroom, the rest of the apartment is just as dim, and god _damn_ it is fucking hot. He’s looking for his coat, because he remembers it falling to the floor. It’s a weird but fuzzily distinct memory of the night, but now, said memory’s draped over the back of the couch, and he doubts himself. He doubts the images of blood soaked teeth that keep falling to the front of his mind, and the pain—

He spits out a hissed curse when he prods at his neck, the pain just as vicious as he remembered it. The entire left side of his neck aches, tender and inflamed like an infection, and when he presses down gently, his whole head spins. He has to move slowly, his stomach twisting and his head, _his damn head_ spinning like a top every time he takes a step forward. The door creaks when he opens it, and it sends his heart up into a staccato jump again, for a moment. He’s afraid, he realizes, and the notion strikes him so suddenly it almost makes him laugh out loud. Afraid? _Of what?_ He had too much to drink last night, that’s all. Whiskey always gives him weird dreams. Still…he can’t quite calm the jittering of his nerves, or the tremble in his fingers when he makes his way down the rickety old stairs. He can see light, finally, coming from the big windows on the ground floor, and it feels like salvation, like relief. Like all he needs to do is step outside into that bright blue winter sky and this strange night will be left behind him.  
He’s walking, trying to hail a cab, when his phone buzzes again, and this time he answers.

“Hanji.”

_“LEVI?? WHERE THE HELL HAVE YOU BEEN? I called like 20 times!! You left last night, we had no idea where you went, not a text or a call—”_

“I know, I’m sorry. I’m heading home now.”

_“Should I come get you? Where are you? I’ll pick you up, just stay—”_

“No! No, I got a cab, it’s fine. I’ll call you later.”

He hangs up before Hanji can answer, and settles into the back of the cab. He feels at ease here, like he can actually think without all that fucking liquor coursing through his system, but he still can’t remember a damn thing. He remembers Hanji, and Petra, and the couple of bars they hit before the club, and whiskey, Armin’s mouth, _red red red,_ but it’s disjointed and strange and it makes him feel dizzy all over again. His phone buzzes again, two short vibrations that signify a text, and he opens up the notifications before he realizes it’s an unknown number.

_Sorry._  
 _I might have come on a little strong last night._  
 _Or a lot. Honestly, I’m a terrible judge of myself._  
 _Let’s see each other again._

He stares at the messages, and even now, when he’s clear headed, the words trigger a nervous curl in his stomach. Blood in teeth, cold fingers, they’re pressing into his bones again, and it makes him shudder, like last night, he thinks. He leans back in his seat and closes his eyes. He wants his apartment, his bed. Even his roommate’s stupid cat. He wants familiarity and cleanliness, and he wants to sleep this off like a bad dream.

He looks at his phone again, studies the texts, dissects the words. 

He debates on replying, but in the end, he deletes them all. 

 

When he finally makes it back to his apartment, feet dragging and ready to fall into bed, the door whips open before he can turn the handle.

“Levi!!”

He groans at the sight of Hanji, exhausted and confused and so not wanting to deal with this right now. He allows himself to be yanked forward, stumbling over the carpet. His coordination is all fucked up, head swimming vertigo-sick, limbs heavy. He feels like he’s moving through a lucid dream, not entirely in control of his body even though he’s trying. Hanji shuffles him out of his coat, chatting rapidly, panic-laced, but Levi’s hardly listening. His heartbeat feels slow now, sluggish, until Hanji presses softly on his neck, and his senses snap into awareness.

“Fuck off! Jesus Christ, get-- fucking get--”

He lurches forward when he moves, and stumbles against the coffee table, slipping towards the floor until he’s lifted, pulled backwards by strong hands. He’s vaguely aware of movement, the cat bolting from her resting place on the couch when Levi’s slumped onto it. His roommate's coming around the edge of the couch with a glass of water, setting it aside to instead tilt Levi's face up for inspection. Erwin's warm hands feel cool against the heat flaming his skin.

"Levi, are you still drunk?"

He can't explain precisely the feeling he's going through right now, a sick churning mix of all the symptoms of intoxication without the alcohol, like he's forcing his body to move, but can't slip into anything other than slow motion.

"I wish."

Erwin takes his statement with a sharp nod, the easy acceptance Levi's always liked about his roommate. He passes the glass of water to Levi, and watches while he drinks it, Hanji looking somewhat worried, but curious by his side.

"Do you remember what happened last night?"

It's probably the most calm and serious he's ever seen Hanji, and that's something remarkable in the span of their eight-or-so year friendship.

"I remember the club..."  
 _Lights flashed red_  


"I went home with somebody..."  
 _Sweet smile, sharp teeth_  


"Something...my neck..."  
 _Pain, agony, oh god, was he dying?_

He presses lightly on the side of his neck and gasps aloud when the pain flares up again. He pushes himself up, moves slowly past Erwin and into the dim bathroom. When he flicks on the light, his eyes burn for a moment, but when his vision clears, he wants to turn it off again.

The entire right side of his neck is bruised, livid purple-tinged welt spreading from the bottom of his ear, well onto his shoulder when he pushes the collar of his shirt aside. There's a center to the whole thing, just above the curve where neck and shoulder meet, and just below his pulse point. The bruise is darker there, like the eye of a storm, all the pain radiating from that spot. 

“Here. It’s gonna hurt, but keep this against the bruise.”

Erwin looms behind him in the mirror, a bag of frozen peas held out in reverse offering. Levi scowls when he takes the peas, grimaces when he puts the bag against his neck. It does hurt, a pulse of pain flaring up like a thread of lightning across his skin. The pain makes him lightheaded again, but Erwin’s there to brace him when he sways. Hanji brings him a glass of orange juice and leftover Christmas cookies when he sits down, and makes him eat, despite his protests of getting crumbs in the couch cushions.

“You’re white as a sheet, you’re lightheaded and dizzy, and you have a bruising wound on your neck. I draw blood on a daily basis, I know what the symptoms of blood loss look like, dumbass. Eat your cookies, there’s a good boy.”

Hanji looks less worried now, and more smug after Levi begrudgingly admits he does feel better with sugar in his system. Erwin brings him another bag from the freezer to replace the defrosting peas. He feels alive now, pain still pulsing in his shoulder and neck, but it feels more like a dull ache, like he slept wrong, rather than the agonizing throb it had been earlier. 

“You seriously don’t remember anything?”

Hanji can’t help but press for details; it’s always been that way, for as long as they’d know each other, Hanji’s curiosity and thirst for knowledge unquenchable. 

“I told you what I remember. I drank too much, I went home with somebody--”

“What did he look like? Do you remember that?”  


“Small, blonde, weird eyes…”  
 _Such strange eyes._

“And what, that’s it? You fucked, and stumbled back home looking half dead?”

“I told you--”

“Levi, when you come back to your apartment with a fucking _wound_ on the side of you neck, how do you expect me to react? Did he have any weird pets? Did _he_ bite you? I know you’re into some kinky shit--”

“Fucks sake, Hanji, would you shut up? I don’t know what happened. I slept weird, or I got hit--”

“There is no way, no fucking way. _That_ is a wound, and you should see a doctor for it, at the least.”

“No, I’m fine, I just need to sleep and have some water. It’s fine, I’ll be fine tomorrow.”

“Hanji’s right.”

Ah, there it is, the roommate concern that only surfaces when Levi’s done something truly, irrevocably stupid or concerning. He hates how easily Erwin cuts to the quick, how he was always right about the important stuff. Levi _knows_ Erwin’s always right, Erwin knows, too, but his damn stubbornness kept him from following through on the things he should, especially when he’d much rather avoid the whole situation entirely. 

“It’s fine, I just need some sleep.”

Erwin stares at him, like he wants to say more, to press the issue further, but at least, in that big brain of his, he’s always known when to back off. That was the thing about Erwin; he always _knew_ , somehow, whatever it was that needed knowing.

“If it gets worse, you should go. I might not be around to stop Hanji from dragging you off, either, so keep that in mind.”

Erwin’s smile is tight, just a little thing playing at the corner of his mouth, mischievous and sly, but his eyes are serious, a threat lurking just beyond the openness of his gaze. If he gets worse, Levi will end up at the doctor’s, with or without his participation. 

He ends up sleeping away the entirety of the first day of the new year, stirring only once when Erwin wakes him to force more water and actual food upon him. He feels like complete shit when he's woken up, feels even worse when he wakes in the middle of the night drenched in cold sweat with the lingering sensation of teeth at his throat. He lies in bed and stares at the clock on his nightstand, forcing himself to stay awake, if only to drive away the vividness of the dream. He drifts off at some point, when the bright green numbers blur against the inside of his eyelids, and wakes when the sun creeps across his nose.

He breathes deep, once, twice, burrows a little deeper underneath his quilt. He feels different, alert, like a beam of sun cutting through fog. It's still early, when he rolls out of bed, early enough that Erwin is still sleeping. The bathroom light is less harsh today; his face doesn't stand out in gaunt features, and the bruise is still there on his neck, but it's less violent, tinged yellow around the edges as it begins to fade from his skin. It's strange, but the only remnant of the night before, besides the bit of bruise, is a headache behind his eyes. The shreds of memories he has have taken on a dreamlike quality, turning them fuzzy and unrealistic. He doubts them, now, in the sunlight.

Weekend passes in a blur, laundry, dishes, takeout with Erwin. The cat’s been hiding since Levi came home on New Year’s, but she creeps out Sunday evening, wanders close enough to sniff at Levi, but won’t let him touch. He finds it strange, but counts it as a win, affectionate, needy cat turned skittish is fine by him. Hanji calls to check on the bruise, and he stands in front of a mirror and describes it, pretending he hasn’t locked himself in the bathroom several times over the weekend and examined it from every angle he could see.

_“No redness? No pus?”_

“No, god, that’s disgusting. I told you, it’s fading fast. Just yellow now, I can barely see it.” 

It looks more like a discoloration on his neck now, rather than the bruise it had been. He’d been bashed, smashed and broken many, many times in the span of his life, and he’d never seen something fade as quickly as this bruise. It hardly hurt, just a little lance of pain when he pressed on the darker center of it all. He didn’t even put ice to it anymore. 

_“Are you sure? Something that large shouldn’t have disappeared as quickly as you say it did.”_

“Well, I don’t know what to tell you. I’m looking at it right now, and it’s almost gone. It doesn’t even hurt anymore.” 

Hanji’s quiet on the other end of the phone, pouting. 

_“Well, I still think you should get it checked out. You don’t know what happened, or you’re refusing to tell us--”_

“I’m not refusing, I told you what I remember--” 

_“--and bloodborne pathogens can take their time before any symptoms show up, and you could be incubating some disease right now, and you don’t even know it. You think looking for pus is gross? I’ve seen how bloodborne illnesses can spread throughout a body. That’s fucking gross.”_

“I’m not going to see a doctor so I can pay them to tell me I’m perfectly fine. It’s fading, it doesn’t hurt, I feel fine, end of discussion.” 

Hanji’s sigh is almost palpable through the phone. 

_“Fine, fine. Not like I know what I’m talking about or anything. Just remember what Erwin will do if it gets worse.”_

“He’ll drag me there himself, yeah, yeah. Bye.” 

He hangs up before Hanji can launch into another discussion, and takes another look at himself in the mirror. He looks about as good as it gets; dark hair, dark eyes, white skin. The bruise hangs like a shred of yellow silk on his throat, but otherwise, he doesn’t look half-bad, no worse than he usually does at the end of a long weekend. 

He lies flat on his back in bed trying to remember exactly what happened in the late hours of New Year’s Eve, and finds he can’t quite recall the exact events. They’re all vague memories, tangled up with the strange dreams he’s been having of slender bodies and heavy eyes. He presses his fingertips to the spot on his neck where the bruise had centered, feels the warmed skin and the lightest reach of his pulse. Nothing but normalcy. He falls asleep with his hand curled gently around his throat. 

He slips back into routine on Monday morning, Levi and Erwin, their normal orbit of work and food and chores. He forgets his strange hookup as other thoughts invade his mind, going hours at a time before the bruise slips back into his thought stream. He convinces himself the fog of memories are nothing more than the remnants of bad dreams brought on by shitty whiskey, the bruise now completely gone from his throat. Hanji examines him again on Wednesday, floored into silent observation of nothing but Levi’s white skin. There’s absolutely no evidence of any kind, and in his mind, that’s good enough. 

He doesn’t notice someone’s been following him until Friday. 


	2. aurum

_Screaming in the dark I howl when we’re apart_  
 _Drag my teeth across your chest to taste your beating heart_

 

The night had started well enough- drinks, dancing, the excitement of the whole city pulsing through their veins.  That energy carried over into every person, Mikasa tipsy and giggling at his side, beautiful, sad, somber Armin smiling for once, and not one of his fake, dead smiles, but a _real_ smile.  They all three clung to each other as they pushed through crowds, laughing and bumping into each other.  The city sang in their ears, the noise and press of people that would normally be irritating instead joyous.

Mikasa tried to drag them both onto the dance floor, but Armin begged off, wanting to get away from the crowds for a few moments.  Both of them had slipped into concern then, ready to grab their coats and leave, continue the countdown from the couch in their apartment, but Armin smiled and laughed sweetly.

“None of us have been out in so long, go enjoy some time to yourselves.  Really, I’m fine, I’m just gonna get some air.”

He squeezed both their hands and slipped away, blending in with the crowd with practised, precisely unnoticed movements.  Mikasa tugged Eren’s hand gently, and they fell back into the crowd of dancing people.  It’d been so _long_ since they’d had time to themselves, just the two of them, besides the few snatched hours before work, and it’s so easy to fall into a dirty dance-floor intimacy, Mikasa’s hands in his hair, his on her waist.  She’s gorgeous, bright-eyed and happy and biting her lip when Eren’s hands wander.

It’s midnight before he realizes, caught up in the sway of Mikasa’s hips, and the swell of the bass rattling his bones. 

“Oh, Armin!  Where is he?  He’ll miss it.”

Eren stretches up onto his tip toes and looks for any glance of Armin, but there were too many people packed in tightly around him, all buzzing with the same excitement.  The countdown is deafening, once all the drunken slurring syncs up.  Mikasa holds his hand, and they both scream _Happy New Year’s!_ when the numbers tick down.  He kisses her, and it’s so cheesy, so rom-com cliché, it makes her laugh.

The music starts up again, but they’re done, happy and buzzed, but missing a vital part of their trio.  Armin has been melancholic as long as they’ve known him, but lately, he’s been worse, dwelling longer in the dark corners of his mind, holing up in his room and sleeping time away.  He’s dwindling, the secret, vivacious sparkle in his eyes worn down to a dull glitter.  He lives, but is listless, a husk of what he once was.  He was lovely to see tonight, to see the life creep back into his eyes, and for a few hours, for once, Eren didn’t worry.

He feels a little bad now, though, having left his friend to his own devices for so long on a night so exciting.  There are so many people packed into the club that simply maneuvering, nevermind looking for someone, is near impossible. 

“Do you see him anywhere, Mika?  Maybe he’s outside.”

He’s not, though, and another scour of the club yields fruitless results.  Armin doesn’t answer his phone, won’t reply to Eren’s texts, and now, _now,_ he’s starting to get worried.

It’s two in the morning, and Eren and Mikasa leave to search the city for Armin.

His worry soon grows to tangled rage as every haunt, every dark corner remains strictly void of Armin.  Worst case scenarios whips through his mind, the looming terror of finding him dead or curled up in darkness, the hope of finding him _whole_ and _alive_ swimming through his weary thoughts, the anguish of his mind exhausting him faster than the search.  Mikasa is perfect, not chiding, not trying to drag him home, just his silent, beautiful support, just as dedicated to finding Armin as he is. 

They search until the sun starts to crawl over the tops of the buildings, and then search a bit longer, until the sky’s bright and blue and the not-quite-sleeping city stirs into life again.  Eren punches a wall inside a grimy gas station bathroom and sinks down into defeated tears, Mikasa sinking with him.  They’re two hours from the apartment, way on the other side of the city, and Eren falls asleep on the subway when they head home.

Only to arrive back at the apartment to find Armin stumbling naked into the bathroom to throw up whiskey.  Eren screams his name when he slams the door, pushing his way in, since Armin didn’t lock it.  Armin is so drunk, and so unabashedly _not sorry_ that Eren’s anger only ignites further, shoving the white little body away when he tries to lean in for a kiss.  Mikasa comes in when Eren’s voice raises even further, and shuffles Armin back to bed.  She’s angry, but she’s also  level-headed and calm, Eren’s inverse, the other side to his coin.  She clicks Armin’s bedroom door shut and pushes Eren to the couch.

“He’s been with someone.”

And Eren sees red, fucking _seethes_ with anger, because there are fucking _precautions_ and _rules_ between them for a reason, and Armin doesn’t care.  Maybe Armin’s lonely, or tired, or just looking for a change, but he obviously cares so little for his own safety that it bends Eren’s heart with an ache that burns like ice.

“ _Fuck_.”

Mikasa’s hand is in his hair again, her fingers trying to work some of the tension out of his frame.  He buries his face in his hands, listens to the sound of his own breathing, and wills down some of the anger threatening to explode out of him.

“What are we gonna do, Mika?” 

She doesn’t answer, just shakes her head silently, bumps her shoulders closer to Eren’s.  They stay that way, on the couch, for a long time, until Mikasa kisses his cheek and pulls them both into bed.

He wakes up when Armin nudges him over, in a blur of drowsiness until his thoughts snap back to anger.  He almost doesn’t budge over, ready to turn his back on Armin and press closer to Mikasa, to feign sleep until Armin goes away.  But Armin’s in that mood that comes after sex and rejuvenation, giggly insistence and devilish grins, and he forces his way under Eren’s sheets. 

“Eren, are you angry with me?”

His voice is a sweet whisper, the press of his body a cold weight across Eren’s chest.  He runs the tips of his fingers across Eren’s face, tracing the curve of his cheek, his lips, with gentle movements that never fail to soothe Eren’s frayed nerves.

“Yes.”

Armin’s fingers stop over Eren’s mouth as he speaks, feeling the word as it’s uttered, listens as Eren continues in the lowest whisper he can manage.

“You left us.  Without warning, without- _anything_.  Do you have any idea how worried I was? We both were?  I was waiting, _preparing_ myself to find you dead.  Do you have _any_ idea, any concept of how terrifying that feeling is?”

Armin’s cool hand stills on Eren’s cheek, his thumb grazing the top of the cheekbone.  He shifts to rest more of his weight along Eren’s body, pressing his ear against Eren's chest.  It's his favorite way to rest, cheek pressing soft against his or Mikasa's chest, listening to the quiet murmuring of their heartbeats.

 _I can hear life,_ he would say, as one of them slipped off into sleep.  Eren wondered, in a violent stab of jealousy, if Armin had lain that way with the person he'd brought home.  If that person still had a heartbeat moving in their chest.

"I'm sorry.  I shouldn't have worried you, or Mikasa, sweet girl.  You both looked so magnificently happy last night, I- I wanted you to stay that for a while.  You do so much for me, you both do.  You deserve some time to yourselves."

"Armin-"

"Don't forget, don't _ever_ forget how much I owe you.  I...got caught up last night, and I should've done things differently, but don't think you're ever going to be any less important to me, you or Mikasa."

Eren tightens his arms around the back of Armin's head, the closest he can reach.  Armin's fingers are tight in his t- shirt.  Eren is vaguely aware of the soft sound of Mikasa's breathing, curled up on her side of the bed.  He doesn't know if it's just her ability to sleep through most anything, or Armin's influence that keeps her from waking.   Maybe a mix of both.

Armin props himself up, his elbows jabbing into Eren's stomach for a second, and presses a kiss to his mouth, another, another, until Eren's hips shift a little.  He grins against Eren's skin when they breathe against each other for a moment, and slides a bit further down Eren's body.

"Let me make it up to you."

" _Armin!_   Mikasa hates-"

"Better be quiet, then."

A fistful of golden hair slips through Eren's fingers, as Armin ducks beneath the blankets and tugs Eren's boxers down as far as he can.  Eren tries to stop him, _wants_ to stop him, but Armin’s mouth is warm, and Eren has to bite his own hand to keep silent.

 

 

If curiosity killed people as well as cats, he’d be so dead.  Not that he’s going to live on, after this.  This guy is small, but looks like he could be lethal, in that cagey, cornered animal way.  It wasn’t actually that hard, tracking him down.  All it took was a peek at Armin’s phone, pulling a number from a text, doing some skulking on the internet.  He knows he’s dumb; Mikasa is sharp, and Armin’s just brilliant, but Eren’s smart in his own way, as Armin so loved to remind him.  Finding information is what he’s good at, thanks to all that boredom in high school.  It took him less than ten minutes to find what he was looking for, on Sunday’s dozy afternoon when Armin’s sleeping and Mikasa’s working.  Took him less than an hour to spot the man he’s looking for, as he walks to the subway on a cold January evening. 

Eren feels safely unnoticed in the crowds of people, it being difficult to find someone you’re actually looking for, nevermind someone you’re not aware is watching you.  He trails the man every night after he gets off work, killing time until six, and then watching as the man leaves his office building and moves quickly to the subway station down the block.   Eren’s never been good at the quiet, stealthy work, leaving it up to Mikasa when necessary, but he finds following this man to be simple enough.  Keep your distance, don’t draw attention to yourself, and _don’t stare_.  He’s learned to project a simmering confidence over the years, to tone down his own brash passion and appear cooly collected, even when he’s ripped up on the inside.  He acts like he has a casual purpose, which isn’t too far from the truth, just warped a little.  This guy, though, he’s smarter than Eren had planned on, or just more acutely aware of his surroundings that Eren had estimated.  On Friday, he catches Eren’s glance when he stops abruptly to check his phone.  There’s a bit of tension that crosses his face, a little wrinkle of the forehead on his otherwise expressionless face, but his eyes snap straight ahead, and he plows his way into the crowd on the sidewalk.  Eren loses him quickly.

Eren suspects he’s caught on, even though it’s just been a few days of observation, but the next week, the man tends to slip into the crowds unseen by Eren, or not leave his building by the time Eren’s strolling past.  Eren’s patient. 

He lingers in a Starbucks across the street one night and stares out the window while sipping his coffee.  He sees the man leave around four, when the sky’s just beginning to dim, the dark shadow of his coat darting in the midst of the stream of people crowding the sidewalk. 

Paranoia’s setting in.  Paranoia is good.  Eren smiles against the rim of his cup.

His talent for subterfuge doesn’t last much longer, however, because one night, he’s haunting the row of sidewalk trees right next to the small man’s office building, and all of a sudden the short man is in his face.

“Who the fuck are you, and why the everloving _fuck_ have you been following me?!”

This close, the man’s intense, steel-eyed and tension coiled like a snake in his body.  Eren fears for the safety of his teeth and his bones, all those interesting breakable parts in the human body.  Except, in the years that Armin had been in his life, he’s caught on to the art of false intimidation, projecting a completely fake personality in order to get away with murder.  Little tension in the eyes, an angling of the head, relaxed but ready for action.

“Stay away from Armin.”

He’s seen it before, in the people he’s bullied into keeping their distance from Armin, the flash of defiance, the teenage curl of the lip that says _you can’t tell me what to do_.  After all, Armin’s always been enticing, an insatiable charm to those he’s been with.

This, though, this expression is new.  The man’s face softens, almost involuntarily, into something close to panic.  It’s brief, so very brief that Eren would have missed it if he wasn’t paying attention, if he hadn’t _learned_ to pay attention, but the expression clouds over and settles back into the bored neutrality Eren’s seen these past weeks.

“Who says I’m going anywhere near him?”

Ah, this is more familiar, the cryptic game of push and pull, yes and no.  Eren grins and sharpens his gaze on the man, looking down with that _look_ , the one Mikasa says makes him look like a pretentious asshole, the one Armin says makes him look like a vicious criminal.

“Let’s just keep it that way.”

The man raises an eyebrow, pulls off utter contempt so well that Eren’s a little impressed.  His eyes are wary, his body language screams distress, and Eren senses that the situation’s about to get a little more difficult to deal with.  The man steps backwards, his phone pressed to his ear, and Eren realizes he’s called the cops when he starts speaking.

“I’m being harassed-”

He doesn’t panic, just reacts, bare animal instinct in a tense situation.

He surges forward and shoves the guy up against the wall behind them, movie style, hands twisted in the front of the guy’s coat and everything, but his fingers are flung off the fabric as the man does some flip with his arms.  Eren’s ready for a fight, back alley scuffle just like high school, but when he grins wide and manic, the panic blooms across the man’s face again, and he ends it there with a surrender of his hands.

Eren’s breath is coming in short puffs of frosty air, watching as the man backs away and slips into the crowd of people shuffling on the sidewalk.  He’s left, breathing hard, adrenaline pumping, in the shadowed corner of a building on a dim evening in January, confused and surging with worry.

When he slips back to the apartment, Armin’s bundled up on the couch, hair mussed and sleepy-eyed.  He smiles when Eren tugs on his blanket, grunts when Eren presses his weight over the top of his body.

“Didn’t you just wake up?”

Armin laughs beneath him, a garbled twist of joy and pain as the air’s being squashed out of him.

“I’ve been up for a couple hours, just waiting for _you_ to get home, slowpoke.”

Eren stretches up as far as he can and kisses Armin's chin, the closest bit he can reach.  Armin groans and laughs again when Eren pushes off the couch and rifles through the plastic bags he'd left on the table.

"You hungry?"

"Nah.  Come sit with me."

They settle into each other, wrapped up in Armin's huge blanket, warm and snuggled like two little beings in a cocoon. Armin's golden hair glints in soft lamp-glow, like a hazy, burnished coin in the corner of Eren’s vision.  He wants to hold this precious little body close to him, to wind him up in protection and happiness and safety, and he’s stricken _so suddenly_ by this urge that it sets his head spinning for a moment.  Armin’s always been so preternaturally good at sensing his mood, both his and Mikasa’s, but Eren he reads like a book.  He shifts against Eren, cool hand sliding against the bit of Eren’s arm where his sleeve had pulled away and squeezes over the pulse point on his wrist.

“Everything okay?”

Eren thinks of foggy gray eyes, of another body in Armin’s bed, and feels a vicious stab of anger rip through his mind. 

Armin’s eyes are wide, his hair flashing like molten metal when Eren surges forward to kiss him.  He’s instantly open to Eren, soft and sweet and lovely beneath Eren’s hands, fluttering whimpers coming from his mouth when Eren moves hard.

“Eren...what’s- _ah_ , _ooh_ \- what’s the matter?”

Armin does this to him every time, unravelling him with just the press of a kiss.  He’s putty in Armin’s care, a completely malleable figure in cool white hands, and Eren revels in it.

He fumbles for something slick on the coffee table, slips Armin’s soft pants over his bony hips, Armin tugging at the button on his jeans.

“Eren…”

“I want you.”  It comes out so fierce that Armin glances up at him, wetting his lips with his pink tongue.

“Obviously.”

He gives another tug to Eren’s jeans and pops the button free, pushing at the fabric until Eren gets the hint and kicks them off.  Their movements are harsh, bodies half-dressed and eager.  Eren prods inside Armin with a crooked finger, sits back on his heels, bare- assed and aching, and watches his beautiful boy writhe.  Armin’s oversized shirt slips further off his shoulder every time he arches off the couch, blanket forgotten and draped halfway over the floor.  He’s a little debauched Veronese, open-legged and fucking himself on Eren’s fingers, would fuck himself senseless that way, if Eren weren’t so heady with desire.

He hooks one of Armin’s white legs over the curve of his shoulder and presses in, swallowing the wail that buds in Armin’s throat, delicious sound, delightful sound.  Armin’s hips move, the little self-fuck circle chasing the pleasure that shoots all the way down to his toes.  Eren adjusts for a better angle until Armin groans, knee almost pressed into his chest.  His fingers are curled tight into Eren’s shirt, pulling and twisting and clutching, and Eren’s never seen anything so beautiful.

“Armin…”

There’s a cool hand on the back of Eren’s neck.

“I want you.”

“I know, baby.”

“I want you here, and tomorrow, and forever-”

“ _Oh god-_ ”

“My little treasure.”

“Eren-”

They move against each other, twist of the hips, tug of the skin, until Armin whines against Eren’s mouth and they both fall into a heap against each other.  Eren kisses his sweet lips tenderly, and pulls him close enough to whisper,

“You’re mine.”

Armin laughs breathless against him, delighted giggles that wrench their way straight to Eren’s heart.

“You’re so cheesy, oh my god.”

They stay together, slumped over each other and half-dressed, Eren’s heart rattling against his ribs, Armin’s ear pressed to his chest.  Eren’s burrowed underneath the blanket with Armin by the time Mikasa gets home.  He’s roused from a dozy half-sleep when she closes the door, and groans in disapproval.

“Seriously, guys?  The _couch_?  People sit there.”

Armin laughs when he rolls off of Eren, slipping into his pants and kissing Mikasa’s cheek as he walks by.

“Sorry, Mikasa.  I’ll make dinner, just relax for a bit.”

“But-”

“C’mon, it’s fine, I can press buttons on a microwave.  Make Eren stand up before he falls asleep.”

“I’m not gonna fall asleep.”

Armin laughs from the kitchen as Mikasa gives Eren the eye.  There’s a bit of a smile playing on her lips, but she looks unsure, her eyes shifting all over Eren’s roughened form, and it’s a look that sets a nervous edge to his teeth. 

Armin’s perky and chipper when he calls them into the kitchen to eat, flitting from room to room in their small apartment with chores on his mind.  He’s bright-eyed and chatty, asking them about their days, how work went, guffawing at the stories Mikasa tells and grinning when Eren laughs with him.  He’s bursting with energy after dinner, even though Eren and Mikasa are nodding off, so he sends them off to bed with a kiss each.

When Eren flops into bed, curling against Mikasa’s back, he’s ready to drift off, exhausted from a week’s worth of restless nights and an occupied mind, but Mikasa shifts in his arms until her head is tucked under his chin.  Her breath puffs warmly against his collarbone, and he can feel his body numbing as he falls closer to sleep.  He doesn’t register that she’s speaking to him, thinking it’s part of a dream, but she prods him awake with her finger in his stomach.

“What?”

“I asked if you had a bad day.”

He tugs her closer, presses his nose to her dark hair. 

“No.”

But then he thinks of the small man he followed, the streak of possessiveness that gripped him in the haze of Armin’s golden presence.

“You fuck Armin when you’ve had a bad day.”

She whispers so softly that if they hadn’t been pressed close, Eren would have missed her words.  But he does hear her, and catches the tone of jealousy in her voice, and he doesn’t know what to do with it.

“I found the guy he fucked.  On New Year’s.”

She pushes away from his chest to meet his gaze.  Her eyes catch a bit of the light from between the window slats, wide in the dark.

“ _What?_ You found him?”

He nods into her hair, that protective instinct flaring up.

“What did you do?  Does he remember anything?”

And now, hindsight kicks in.  The contented buzz he’s had since kissing Armin is deflating with the sense of _wrong wrong wrong_ , the realisation that his temper got the best of him _again_ , and that the danger he’d been trying to head off in the face of Armin’s impulsivity is now ripped open like a wound.

“I don’t- I don’t know.  He kinda figured out I was following him a few weeks ago, and he...threatened to call the cops today-”  
“Eren!”

“-but he took off instead.  I took the long way home, but I don’t know-”

“What are we gonna do?  What if someone figures it out?  Have you told Armin yet?”

He has the words poised on the tip of his tongue, _no, he doesn’t need to know_ , but he can’t spit them out.  They’re wrapped up in guilt and secrecy and the _need_ to protect, to somehow salvage the situation so it’s not as bad as it actually is, but his brain’s running on empty, silence ringing between the two bodies in the bed, Mikasa’s breath coming in soft, steady puffs.

“Eren, he’s gonna be pissed.  You know how he gets.”

“He doesn’t need to find out.”

He’s so firm in his words that the tone startles even him.  Mikasa tenses against him, but he seeks to ease the blow his words have struck her by squeezing her tightly against him.  She acquiesces to the embrace with the still reluctance so pronounced when she’s unsure.

“He doesn’t need to know, and he won’t find out.  I’ll fix this, just like last time.  I can handle it fine.”

“You _didn’t_ handle it fine last time.  It was a mess we almost didn’t get away from.  Armin almost didn’t-”

“It’s not gonna happen again, Mikasa.  I won’t let it.”

The air hangs heavy again, punctured by light noises from Armin bustling around the apartment.  His heart aches with the slow burning of the past creeping up on him, memories he’d tried so hard to forget, ones that never truly leave.  Mikasa’s hands are gentle on his face, her fingertips pressing lightly into the skin on his cheekbones.  He turns his head and kisses her palm.

“It’s gonna be fine, Mikasa.  Everything’s gonna be fine.”

 

 

 _Let’s go out,_ Armin says in March, the weekend before Eren’s birthday, and Eren’s heart thunders in his chest.  Armin hasn’t left the apartment since New Year’s, content with Eren and Mikasa and stacks of books in the season he cheekily calls his “winter hibernation”.  He seemed to pick up on Eren’s worries after the last time, in that empathetic way of his, and did what he could to soothe them.  For that, Eren was grateful, but twisted up with guilt after finding the man Armin brought home.  He buried those encounters deeply within him, after Mikasa found out, and Armin never showed any hint that he knew.  That was fine by him.  Armin seemed happier, sweeter these days, and the longer his good mood could stretch on, the longer Eren was willing to hide some of the truth from him.

“We should go out,” Mikasa said, later that night, when Armin was bright-eyed and awake, and they were settling in for the night. 

“Mikasa…”

“It’s been since New Year’s, and I know _you_ know how Armin’s been keeping to the rules.  Even he gets restless being shut up in the apartment all the time.”

It tore at him that night, a little spark of excitement that yeah, maybe they should go out, maybe it’ll be good for Armin, layered over all of his doubts and fears and plain worries that something could (would) go wrong.  Armin didn’t draw trouble, but he did draw attention, the sweet face, gentle movements, an allure all his own, a bit irresistible to the soft of mind.  Siren call straight to the heart, a poisoned arrow piercing the marrow, and Armin snags someone new, a new ache settling in Eren’s chest, a new flare of anger ripping through his bones.

But Mikasa kisses his cheek in the morning, Saturday morning, before she gets out of bed, and Eren’s viciously reminded of how little time he gets to spend with her outside of caring for Armin.  She truly deserves better, someone who’s heart is entirely devoted to her, but Eren knows her, how stubborn and fierce and protective she is, how much she loves both Eren and Armin, how she’d never be anywhere else.  She’s exactly where she wants to be, and nothing will drive her away.  She slips into Armin’s room, rouses him enough to say goodbye, slips back into their room and kisses Eren goodbye before she goes off to work, and Eren’s made up his mind.

They go to a nice little bar not far from their apartment, a place they’d soon discovered after moving to the city.  Crowded, loud, easy to get lost in, but a comforting place, like their favorite haunt back in the last place they lived.  The energy is fresh, inviting, the societal recharge they all needed after so many weeks of solitude.  It’s warm, too, a breath of spring in the air before the last bitter bite of winter.  Eren can’t help but be a little giddy, with Armin and Mikasa by his side, the joy of an upcoming birthday thrilling, a feeling he’s never lost, ever since he was a child. 

Eren lets his guard down, gets a little tipsy, a little giggly, a little sticky with murky air and beer.  He slides into Mikasa’s side, kisses the pale sliver of her throat where her scarf has loosened, slips his fingers with hers under the table.  Armin is smiling across the table, eyes bright as his gaze slides between them.  Mikasa murmurs in his ear and drags them all out of the bar to another place.  She wants to dance, she _always_ wants to dance, she should’ve danced after college, not gotten involved, not followed him-

She’s warm where she’s pressed close to him, and Armin flirts through the crowd.  Eren keeps an eye on him the best he can, watches his smile change from sunny to seductive, a flash of teeth in the pulse of colored lights. He makes eye contact with Eren and his face brightens, waving with a little flutter of his fingers as he’s swept back into the arms of someone else.  Mikasa distracts Eren, with her hands in his hair, her mouth on his.  She’s not worried, and it’s hard to be when facing her.  He doesn’t realize Armin’s been out of his sight for hundreds of steady heartbeats until they’re ready to leave.

The panic comes rushing back to him all at once, a horrendous, nauseating feeling until Mikasa grabs his hand and pulls him through the crowd.  She’s calm, _so calm_ , leading him back to the restrooms, jerking her chin when he stares at her.  His nerves erupt once he pushes through the door, anger, blind rage bubbling through his veins at the sound of a groan and a smoky laugh.  The stall door’s not even locked, not even shut all the way, and Armin, beautiful Armin is on his knees with a stranger’s hand threading through his golden hair.  His eyes are blazing when he turns to look at Eren, wiping his mouth clean of spit and come and maybe blood.  Eren snaps forward and snatches Armin’s hand, once he’s staggered to his feet, and yanks them both out of the restroom.

Mikasa’s there, outside, coats held out to both of them, but Eren’s too livid to notice, the kind of rage that comes with tunnel vision and violence.  Armin’s hand is crushed in his, Mikasa trailing quickly behind them, speaking softly at Eren’s turned back.  Armin tries to struggle free, complaining of his hand, the cold, louder to Mikasa’s ever-decreasing tone, causing a scene as he’s dragged down the sidewalk.  Eren doesn’t stop moving until they’re in the apartment, closed in by safety and home and everything’s ruined, it’s fucking-

“Ruined, Armin, what the _fuck_ is wrong with you?”

“I didn’t-”

“You can’t keep your mouth closed for one goddamn night?  Were you gonna bend over for him, too, in some fucking bathroom at a club?”

“Eren, it’s alright.”

 _It’s_ not _, Mikasa, can’t you see?  It’s not alright, it’s not even close to alright.  He’s mine, he’s mine, I kiss him, I feed him, I hold him, his heart, he holds mine-_

“Did you feed from him, hm?  Or were you going to fuck him first?”

“I _wouldn’t_ , Eren, you know that!”

_You’re wrong, Armin, you’re so wrong.  I know you, I know your heart, your yellow hair, your blue eyes.  I know you can’t control it most of the time, not when you’re fucking, not when you’re happy and safe and warm-_

“You saw him leave us, you _let_ him go with a _stranger_ -”

“He was just having fun, Eren, calm down.  There’s no harm done, just some fun.”

He feels hysterical now, drunk and overtired and thrumming with anger, and he wants something to _hurt_.

“Armin can take care of himself, it’s alright, Eren.”

“He _can’t_.”

“I can.”

Armin is petulant, like a child, an ancient, aching child with pain in his heart. 

“You don’t own me, Eren.”

 _It hurts_.

“I’m free to do as I please, and as I deem safe.”

_No, nononono-_

“Eren, let’s go to bed.  You’re drunk, let’s go-”

_My heart, his heart, it’s mine, it’s mineminemine-_

“You...can’t.”

All of his anger is collapsing inward like a nova, imminent death, reborn brighter and white-hot, sharp-edged, deadly.

“I can’t, I can’t, it’s too much-”

“Eren let’s go to bed.”

“ _NO!_ ”

The exclamation bursts forth from his throat like the shriek of a wounded animal, as pain-laced as heartbreak.  A tear drips down his cheek, blurring this sight, smudging Armin’s golden halo into a blur.

“I can’t, I have to-”

“Eren, where are you going?”

His wallet, his coat, he’s stumbling out the door.

Mikasa reaches for him but he shrugs her away, slipping out of her grasp before her fingers can land firm.  He’s burning, all-consuming fire, catches Armin’s gaze before the front door slams shut, but all he can see are cold, blue eyes.

He wants to grind bone into ash.

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> originally a fill for the kinkmeme


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